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Chapter 04

Chapter 04

Information
Release Date

June 10, 2005 (LaLa DX, Japan)

Kanji Title

ダム底の燕

Romaji Title

Damu soko no tsubame

Chapter

4

Volume

1

Pages

40

Anime Episode

Season 1, Episode 6

Chapter Guide
Previous
Chapter 03
Next
Chapter 05
List of Chapters

Chapter 04, titled The Swallow Underwater (第四話 ダム底の燕, Daishiwa Damu soko no tsubame), is the fourth and final chapter of the first volume and the overall fourth chapter of the Natsume's Book of Friends manga series, written and illustrated by Yuki Midorikawa.

In Japan, it was first published in Hakusensha's shojo manga magazine LaLa DX in June 10, 2005 (LaLa DX July 2005 issue).

Summary[]

While Takashi Natsume and his new friends, Satoru Nishimura and Atsushi Kitamoto, goes to see a dam under which a village was submerged, he gets possessed by a yokai, Tsubame. She wants to find a human who used to live in the submerged village, and asks Natsume and Nyanko-sensei for help.

Plot[]

With Kitamoto and Nishimura, Natsume goes to a small dam in the heart of the mountains. Because it was hot for a while the water had started to dry up and they are able to see a sunken village. As they are looking Natsume notices a person in the village, but when he mentioned it to the other two they were not able to see it. While Natsume is wondering what it was, he is hit by something and faints. Nishimura and Kitamoto take Natsume back to the Fujiwara's.

Once he wakes up, he is visited by a small number of youkai, who slept in the sunken village but took the chance to get out while the village was dried up to get their names back. As gratitude, Tarusaru, one of the youkai, let Natsume see through his mirror to see the thing that was possessing him. Nyanko-sensei then proceeded to knock down Natsume so that the youkai possessing him would get out of him.

The youkai, unwilling to let go of Natsume, tried to possess him again but Natsume punches it to protect himself. The youkai apologizes, saying that when it saw him it had to possess him to be able to get out of the village because it wanted to meet someone. By possessing Natsume it thought it would have a chance to see the person. Natsume decides to allow it to possess him but he can't take it anymore so Natsume decided to help it find the person it is looking for.

The youkai explains that it is looking for a person named Taniozaki and he lived in Futaba, the sunken village 20 years ago. At school Natsume asks Kitamoto if he heard about Futaba village, then he learns that Kitamoto's father used to live there so Kitamoto decided to ask him father if he knew Taniozaki. As he was walking home, the youkai talked to Natsume, it asked if Natsume had siblings he replied no but it said it used to have siblings but they all died because of itself. It asked if it could hold his hand and he accepted it, while walking it predicted that it would rain Natsume then understands that it used to be a sparrow bird.

Natsume gets Taniozaki's address from Kitamoto at school. After school, Natsume and the youkai walk to where Taniozaki lives, followed by Nyanko-sensei and Tarusaru. While going, Natsume asks the youkai why it wanted to meet him so much. It answers that when it was a sparrow it fell out of its nest and a man put it back in the nest, but because it carried the scent of a man it's parents did not come back and the youkai's siblings all died and before it had realised, it had became a spirit.

Taniozaki would come by and give the spirit food, thinking it was some sort of animal. Because of his kindness, it was able to rest peacefully. As it finishes telling the story it sees Taniozaki, and it is joyful, but Taniozaki, who was not able to see it, just walks past by. It thanks Natsume and leaves. Natsume wonders if it was truly enough, it saw him but Natsume thought that they didn't truly meet. So he decides to take the youkai out, so that it was able to see Taniozaki again. While Natsume is walking back to the Fujiwara's he se Tarusaru, it explains that it was getting sake for The Futaba festival and that there would be a race for a Yukata which would allow a youkai to turn into a human for a day. Natsume decides to follow Tarusaru to The Futaba Festival, but Nyanko-sensei arrives and tells him that Tarusaru was planning to eat him. But because Natsume truly wanted to get the Yukata, Tarusaru's interest in Natsume leads him to decides to help him, it makes a mask and uses his blood on it so that the other youkai doesn't know that he's a human. As the race starts Natsume gets attacked by a bunch a youkai, Nyanko-sensei rushes towards Natsume to knock down the other youkai while he gets the Yukata.

Natsume wakes Tsubame up and tells Tsubame that Taniozaki will take part in a festival and that she should wear the yukata, which allows youkai to turn into a human and go meet Taniozaki but because she isn't strong enough, humans probably won't be able to hear her. Tsubame thanks and hugs Natsume and leaves. After that night, Natsume never sees Tsubame again.

The next day Natsume goes and meet Taniozaki himself and asks him if he met a girl with a blue yukata with pale blue flowers. He answers yes, that he did meet a lost mute girl and shows Natsume a picture he took with her. While looking at it, Natsume tears up a bit then leaves.

Characters in Order of Appearance[]

Afterwords[]

Chapter 4 afterwords illustration

Yuki Midorikawa's afterwords illustration of Chapter 4.

"I lived in a region where a dam was a part of everyday life. Since it's a summer story, it's about the dam drying up, with a time limit until it rains again. So the yokai was a creature somewhat related to rain. I was nervous about going back to doing 40 pages. Even though Natsume acts cool and holds the powerful Book of Friends, he's still clumsy enough to get haunted. For the swallow, I started designing a girl with straigt black hair, but it wasn't quite working right. It clicked for me when I went with lighter, fluffier hair. I wanted it to be creepy, so I limited her facial expressions. Looking back, a lot of yokai have wavy hair. Maybe because Natsume's hair is fine and slick."

Yuki Midorikawa.

Anime and Manga Differences[]

  • Whereas up until now the anime's first season had followed the manga's chapter order, it is the first it deviates from it in deciding to adapt Chapter 5 in Episode 4 before Chapter 4 in Episode 6.

Trivia[]

  • Although he's been here since Chapter 1, this chapter is the first time we learn Atsushi Kitamoto's name (though not his given name). That is not the case for Satoru Nishimura.
  • It is said that Tsubame's parents abandoned them because it had a human scent, this fact is entirely false. As birds have terrible sense of smell. They could have abandoned them for a different reason, like humans that came by the nest frequently, so in reality it may have been possible it wasn't Tsubame's fault that their parents abandoned them.

Navigation[]

N/A Volume 01 Volume 02
Chapters
Chapter 01Chapter 02Chapter 03Chapter 04
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